The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1887-02-06
BRIGHAM YOUNG'S GUIDE.
Story of the Man Who Showed the Mormon
Leader the Road to Utah.

Story of the Man Who Showed the Mormon
Leader the Road to Utah.
New York World
John Y. Nelson, the guide who in 1916 piloted
Brigham Young across the plains and over the
Rocky mountains to the site of the present
capital of Mormondom, is one of the most inter-
estine of the strange band of pioneers and saw
ages now depicting the perils and pleasures OF
frontier life for the delectation of effete East
erners with Buffalo Bill in the Madison-square
Garden.
cit was late in the fall of 1916, think" Mel
son began. as he lit his pipe and showed back his
broad sombrero II was at Cottonwood Springs,
Neb, living with an old Mexican half-breed.
who knew every inch of the Rockies like book.
We were doing nothing in particular and ready
for job when Brigham Young came
along and asked my Mexican friend
and myself to be his guides across the
Rockies, promising US good pay. He had four
companions, Mormon elders l think but can
not remember their Seven in ALL we
started with two emigrant wagons one of them
loaded with -four, bacon, coffee and biscuit
enough for two years supply. don't believe
Brigham had any idea when he started just
where he was going, nor when he would get
back. 1t was sort Of pros pecting trip. He
and the elders called each other brother, and
the old man was a good -natured, jolly sort of
fellow He talked good deal of religious lingo,
but he was not the Sunday school, pious Jonah
kind; would say damn it,, just the same as
would and played good hand at euchre. l was
quite young fellow in those days, and as the
old Mexican didn't speak much English, Brigham
talked good deal with me and tried to convert
me to Mormonism.
He was about forty, we'll set up and with a
big, strong head and neck. / didn't take much
stock IN his arguments defending polygamy
which Joe Smith had recently introduced as a
revelation among the saints But Brigham gave
me the idea of man who was pretty firm in his
| opinion, and actually believed what he preached.
eve nidnt hurry ourselves. much. making
,1oc A.
| pitching our tents for three four days at a
| time when got into a likely region where
game was plenty. and exploring the country for
miles around. l don't think we met white
| M all the way across. There were lots of In
| dams, but they didn't trouble us, JUST coming
| into camp to trade off fresh meat skins for
| bacon and coffee Towards Christmas struck
| Hams Fork. in western Nebraska, after making
journey of nearly thousand miles. There
| we were showed up until the spring
| THAT was particularly hard winter, and the
| snow was forty feet deep in places where it had
drifted over the canyon. But we didn't suffer;
provisions were plenty. there was lots of game.
| and when we couldn't get water we got snow and
| melted it. Our camp at Hams Fork was pitched
| in sheltered valley. and we got all the elk, an
telope and bear we could shoot.
| Late in the spring, when the snow had melt
| en-, struck camp and started straight UP the
mountain about forty miles. Right up the
| top of the mountain we found large lake, fed
by living spring, chuck full of trout that beat
| was about two feet long and weighed five or six
pounds and the flavor" The old trappe1
smacked his lips the recollection of the gusta
tory qualification of forty years before arose il
his mind
brigham was all the time spying out the Law
of the land, and as he looked from the top of the
mountain the level stretch of desert nearly
fifty miles away, he said: The promised land is
| in sight We made our way down the mountain
| without any accident worth mentioning, apd
| when we struck the water now known as Sal
lake, Brigham swallowed a mouthful and named
it Great Salt Lake. Then we struck out abou
six miles to the northwest, and Brigham Young
stopped suddenly in the middle of the valley ani
shouted: This is the spot. this is the place re
vealed TO me oy the Great Spirit in dream lont
| ago. Here we will build the New Jerusalem!
1--WE stayed in the neighborhood about 81,
weeks. Brigham staked out the place SO tina
wecould find it again easily and made
sort of map of it. Then started back to Cot
tonwood Springs. which reached late in tn,
summer Brigham and his friends went t
Nauvoo, Ill. and went off deer hunt will
my Indian friends Next year Brigham took
large party of Mormons over. and Salt LAX
City was built the very spot to which
| enid cd inn